


Sacred Words

by Shiori_Makiba



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Consider Your Headspace, Death, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Other, Slavery, heed the trigger warnings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-20 03:30:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7388752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shiori_Makiba/pseuds/Shiori_Makiba
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There were three sacred words.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sacred Words

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Words in the Heart](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7173134) by [Fialleril](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fialleril/pseuds/Fialleril). 



> Inspired by Fialleril's meta and fan fiction, particular their Double Agent Darth Vader series.
> 
> The trigger warnings in the tags might be considered excessive since the references and implications are pretty veiled and kind of vague but I lean on the side of caution with triggers.
> 
> Constructive feedback is always appreciated.

There were three sacred words.

One of the sacred words was secret.  
So much depended on  
being able to keep your silence.  
Secrets were life.  
Failure to keep secrets  
resulted in pain and death.  
Secrets were freedom.  
The freedom to pick your own name,  
your own family, your own love.  
Regardless of what Depur said or did,  
that which you had chosen and kept secret  
would always be yours.

It was a small freedom.  
But a small freedom was better  
than no freedom.  
And that was the truth.

For truth was another of the sacred words.  
Truth was important as secrets.  
It was everything.

Truth lay in the stories  
told by the Grandmother.  
They taught you about  
Ar-Amu the Great Mother,  
Ekkreth the Sky Walker.  
About the desert and how to respect it.  
That respect could mean the difference  
between life and death.  
And so much more.

There were as many stories as grains of sand.  
And each contained equally countless truths  
Some obvious, some less so.

But one truth to always remember is that the Depuran lie.  
They lie all the time.

They tell you  
that you are not a person.  
The truth was  
that you were a person.

They tell you that  
you have no other name  
than what they give you.  
The truth is that you always have  
the name you chose for yourself  
or the name that loved ones gifted to you.

They tell you that  
you will learn nothing  
but what they teach you.  
The truth is that you will learn plenty  
without and often in spite of your Depur.  
Just listen to the words of the Wise Ones  
and you will have already surpassed  
your Depur in wisdom.

They tell you that  
you know nothing  
but what they tell you.  
The truth was that  
you will often hear things  
that never reach Depur's ears,  
see things that never reach Depur's eyes.

You will learn that in ways that  
have nothing to do with their ears and eyes,  
your Depur is both blind and deaf.

They tell you that  
you are the voiceless  
and that you may not speak.  
The truth is that you are voiceless  
and you can speak.  
In your heart if nowhere else.

They tell you that  
your body belonged to them  
to label and to do with  
as they pleased.  
The truth is that your body might be used  
and changed in ways not of your choosing  
but it was still yours.  
And there were still things  
about it and done to it  
that you can choose.

They tell you that   
they controlled everything.  
That is one of their biggest lies.  
The truth is that  
it is the desert  
who rules all.

Depur can die just as easily  
in its yellow sands,  
its howling winds,  
the heat of its white suns, and  
at the teeth of its white dragons  
as any slave.

Perhaps even more so  
because Depur does not  
respect the desert.

They tell you that you were a slave,   
had always been a slave,  
and would never be anything but a slave.

This is the lie that is the most foul.  
You might be a slave now  
but freedom was always possible.

It might take endurance.  
Scrimping and saving until you generate  
enough coin to buy yourself.

It might take pain.  
The pain of surviving your detonator,  
the pain of leaving your family still in chains.

It might be in death.  
But freedom was freedom.

Freedom was the final sacred word.  
It was rarer than water  
and all the more precious for it.  
We think about freedom  
all the time.  
It was the dream.

The hope that one day,  
you would call none Master.  
That you will fully belong to yourself.

It was often a thin, grim hope.  
A tiny flicker almost lost in the void.

Depuran always tried to kill that flame.  
No matter how small it was.  
Because hope was poison to them.

But Depuran couldn't kill it.  
They could stomp it down  
until it looked like it had gone out.  
But a tiny ember always remained.

And it only took one soft breath  
to kindle it back to life.

And the Great Mother always blows  
that soft breath on her children.  
The Sky Walker might also dance  
across the blue sky,  
singing of hope, freedom, and promises.

Your chains are not permanent,   
they can be broken.  
They will be broken.  
One day, the rain will come.

**Author's Note:**

> Depur is the Tatooine slave word for Master.  
> Depuran is the plural form.


End file.
